May 1, 2013

Touch The Moon

Photo: The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, with the Dragon spacecraft onboard, is seen as it launches from Complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Friday, March 1, 2013. The launch marked the second SpaceX Commercial Resupply Services mission for NASA. Photo Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls.

Photo: The Soyuz rocket is rolled out to the launch pad by train on Monday, December 17, 2012, at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Launch of the Soyuz rocket sent Expedition 34/35 Flight Engineer Tom Marshburn of NASA, Soyuz Commander Roman Romanenko, and Expedition 35 Commander Chris Hadfield of the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) on a five-month mission aboard the International Space Station. Photo Credit: NASA/Carla Cioffi.

Photo: The flags representing Kazakhstan and the nations of the three crew members who were launched in the Soyuz TMA-07M spacecraft are shown at the launch pad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Monday, Dec. 17, 2012. From left to right are the flags of Russia, the United States, Canada and Kazakhstan. Launched on December 19 were Expedition 34/35 Flight Engineer Tom Marshburn of NASA, Soyuz Commander Roman Romanenko, and Expedition 35 Commander Chris Hadfield of the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) on a five-month mission aboard the International Space Station. Photo Credit: NASA/Carla Cioffi.

Photo: An Orthodox priest blesses members of the media shortly after blessing the Soyuz rocket at the Baikonur Cosmodrome launch pad on Wednesday, March 27, 2013 in Kazakhstan. Launch of the Soyuz rocket sent Expedition 35 Soyuz Commander Pavel Vinogradov, Flight Engineer Chris Cassidy of NASA, and Flight Engineer Alexander Misurkin of Russia on a five and a half-month mission aboard the International Space Station. Photo Credit: NASA/Carla Cioffi.

Photo: Expedition 34 Commander Kevin Ford of NASA poses for a photograph with women in ceremonial Kazakh dress at the Kustanay Airport in Kazakhstan a few hours after he, along with Expedition 34 Russian Soyuz Commander Oleg Novitskiy, and Russian Flight Engineer Evgeny Tarelkin, landed their Soyuz TMA-06M spacecraft near the town of Arkalyk on Saturday, March 16, 2013. Ford, Novitskiy, and, Tarelkin returned from 142 days onboard the International Space Station where they served as members of the Expedition 33 and 34 crews. Photo Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls.

Photo: Todd Toth, Science Educator at NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center, conducts an experiment with students to create a cloud in a bottle, Monday, April 22, 2013 at Union Station in Washington. The NASA Science Gallery exhibits are being sponsored by NASA in honor of Earth Day. Photo Credit: NASA/Carla Cioffi.

Photo: A NASA Social participant asks a question to the astronauts onboard the International Space Station in a live downlink from the ISS at a NASA Social exploring science on the ISS at NASA Headquarters, Wednesday, Feb. 20, 2013 in Washington. Photo Credit: NASA/Carla Cioffi.

• Folks in Lawton, Oklahoma, will have the rare chance to touch a nearly 4-billion-year-old piece of moon rock at NASA’s Driven to Explore traveling exhibit, a multimedia experience that immerses visitors in the story of NASA. The exhibit will be at Great Plains Science Day from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Thursday, May 2, 2013.

• The centerpiece of Driven to Explore is the opportunity to touch a lunar rock sample brought to Earth by the astronauts of Apollo 17 in 1972, America’s last human mission to the moon. The rock is one of only eight lunar samples made available for the public to touch.

Driven to Explore allows visitors to learn why we explore, discover the challenges of human space exploration and how NASA provides critical technological advances to improve life on Earth. The exhibit also details the accomplishments of the space shuttle and the International Space Station.

NASA is investing in the building blocks of a more capable approach to space exploration, including research and development to increase space travel capabilities. In support of these efforts, NASA is performing field tests, designing surface systems and conducting advanced human research to ensure that future missions are safe, sustainable and affordable.